Answers in Genesis posted a walkthrough of one of the new exhibits at the Creation Museum. The exhibit is based on Ken Ham’s book The Lie. I believe it’s in the area that used to portray the evils they attribute to belief in evolution. It had a wrecking ball labelled “millions of years” knocking down a brick church, graffiti covering the walls still standing, and videos displaying bizarre caricatures of old-age Christian life. One video featured a teenager smoking weed while trying to convince his kid brother to stop playing video games and watch porn with him. It was like a year-round Hell House, except that the people depicted were all regular church-going Christians, presumably “saved”, so according to Answers in Genesis they’d be going to Heaven not Hell. They were all pretty unhappy, so maybe they were experiencing Hell on Earth… but that seems rather unbiblical.

Graffiti in the old Creation Museum exhibit

The replacement exhibit also includes a lot of graffiti, but now the graffiti’s not a symptom of evil – it’s art! That says a lot about the changes in Christian culture over the last 13 years! The graffiti is supposed to be drawn by a fictional artist character, who is going through this intellectual journey which leads him to write/illustrate the contents of the book The Lie throughout the exhibit. But the artist isn’t reading the book and taking notes, these are all supposed to be his thoughts and his journal entries. The artist is discovering these things himself through his own brilliance. Almost as though he’s the author of The Lie. Except that the author of The Lie is Ken Ham, and this guy is a brilliant well-read graffiti artist living in a loft over his art gallery with skateboards and a hammock and a bike. He’s totally a cool kid. But not a savage kid or a kewl kid or whatever slang modern teens would use. Everything about it feels dated back to what would have been cool in the 70s, minus the drugs.

My question is, is that intentional? Are they deliberately trying to date the exhibit to 1987, when the book was written? If so, is this character supposed to depict Ken Ham? Surely not! He was 37 years old and married with kids when he wrote the book! He was not living in a loft and sleeping in a hammock. Perhaps it’s supposed to depict a younger Ken Ham, when he was coming up with the ideas for the book. But if he has a bohemian past it’s been left out of every biography I’ve read. Where would it fit in? He was married at 21, so any time after that it would have to be a loft for two. Or more, because the kids started coming shortly after that. He graduated University when he was 24 and went straight into teaching High School. There’s really no gap for it to fit in.

So is this some kind of fantasy past for Ken? I doubt it. I really don’t feel like Ken even respects this character. I think it’s just a ploy to reach out to the kids and make the Creation Museum seem cool. I’ve never heard any claims that Ken has any kind of artistic talent or even ambitions. I think he would agree that the character in this exhibit is pretty much the opposite of his personality. And yet he’s portrayed journaling Ken’s words. That’s weird

Furthermore, if it’s not supposed to be Ken Ham, why date it to that time period? Is this just another example of Christian culture lagging decades behind the times? Was the exhibit designed to portray a modern edgy young adult and they just missed? That is basically what the designers say their intent was in the walkthrough. But it seems extreme. The living space has a notable lack of technology. And the mock arcade game on the main floor – that thing’s boxy enough to be from Ken Ham’s youth. Was it supposed to be retro? Was a Cincinnati theatre company giving away an old set from Rent? What happened?